Victim refuses to be broken

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A Christchurch woman says she refuses to be broken by the man she accuses of stalking her as he begins a jail term of two years and five months.

Manuel Piniha Hayward said he was a burglar, and his defence counsel, Donald Matthews, said Hayward denied there was any sexual motive behind the repeated visits to the woman's property.

Hayward, 39, kept his head down and turned away today as a friend of the victim read the victim's statement to the court about the havoc he had caused for the woman, aged in her 40s, and her family.

"How can one person have the right to cause so much anger, torment and suffering? I am sure your intentions were more than just to scare me," the statement said.

"It would take more than someone like you to break me. You are not worth my time or energy."

Christchurch District Court Judge John Strettell jailed Hayward and ordered him to pay $750 to the victim for emotional harm, in instalments after his release from prison.

Hayward is supporting two children in the North Island and another family in Christchurch.

His record has 98 offences and convictions in the youth and district courts, including dishonesty, violence, alcohol and drug offending, and breaches of court orders.

The victim wondered in her statement how Hayward was allowed to stay in the community after committing so much crime.

She said afterwards that she had been hoping for a longer sentence for Hayward on two charges of being unlawfully in her yard, burgling her property and an unrelated charge of receiving a stolen cellphone.

She still felt unsafe and slept with the light on.

Although he had been caught on security cameras raiding her property over a four-month period - interfering with the cameras each time - she wondered whether there had been earlier visits.

When the offending began, she had not moved anyone into the home with her and she had gone away for only one night.

"I wasn't going to allow him to take over my life," she said.

She had the cameras installed that eventually caught him.

Police had undertaken to let her know when he was being released and there was some hope that he might be moved to the North Island.

"I am thinking of selling the house," she said.

She was concerned that Hayward's involvement in the Christchurch rebuild while he had such a serious record meant that people were not being properly checked.

"We are so desperate to get the city rebuilt we are not taking care of the people who are here," she said.

Matthews said Hayward's painting business lost customers after the earthquakes and he had gradually returned to dishonest offending because of financial pressure.